Puttu

Puttu is a very easy breakfast ofcourse well known to all kerala homes. Just sharing for others. Its a steamed rice flour dish. Puttu can be made from the white raw rice powder or the chemba rice powder. It is made in a long steamer which is called as puttu kudam in malayalam.
Below recipe will give about 2 to 2 1/2 tubes of puttu.

Puttu Powder - 2 cups (i used chemba one)
coconut grated - about 1 cup (use more or less as you prefer)
water - about 1/2 cup (a little more or less depending on the flour)
salt

Take puttu powder in a bowl, mix in salt.
Sprinkle water little by little and mix in.
At a point if you take some flour in hand and press, it will hold the shape.
In short the flour should be wet through, but should not go to dough form.
It will take a little practice to find the right amount of water.

Now in the bottom portion of the puttu kudam, fill 3/4 with water and bring it to boil.
In the top cylinder shape, put in the circle sieve first. Add about 2 spoons of coconut. Followed by wet flour, use gentle hands when filling it. half way through add some more coconut grated and then flour and finally coconut grated.
Close the lid.
Keep it on top of the bottom with boiling water.
Steam for 5 minutes. You will see steam coming out of hole on the top lid.
Take it and push it out with a long stick. I use the back of a wooden spatula.
Enjoy with kadala curry or which ever combination you prefer.

Kadala Curry

Kadala curry is a kerala recipe with the black channa. It goes well with puttu or appam or upma.

Black channa(kadala) - 1 cup
coconut grated - 1/2 cup
turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp
chilli powder - 1/2 tsp
coriander powder - 1 tsp
garam masala - 1 tsp
onion - 1
ginger garlic paste - 1 tsp
coconut slices - some
curry leaves
mustard
oil

Wash and soak black channa over night or at least 3 to 4 hours.
Pressure cook it with a little salt and turmeric powder and keep aside.

In a pan dry roast coconut grated until nicely browned. Turn off the flame and add turmeric,chilli,coriander,garam masala and stir well. The heat will be enough to toast them or else you might burn them. Grind them into a smooth paste.

In a pan, add 2 tsp oil, splutter mustard.Add curry leaves.
Add coconut slices and fry till its slightly brown.
Add sliced onion and saute. add ginger garlic paste too and saute.
Now add the cooked black channa, ground paste and salt.
Bring to boil and simmer for 5 minutes. Done.

Pound cake or Vanilla cake

Call it a pound cake or vanilla cake ,this cake is my family's all time favourite. And may be the most often made. Probably many of you will have a similar recipe. If its just to eat as such i follow the below recipe as like.
But if i'm going to do some icing on it, i cut the sugar amount a 1/2 cup less because i feel the cake will be too sweet with filling and icing and you wont be able to eat more :)

With the below quantity, it makes one 13 * 9 inches cake or two 8" rounds.
Remember to use everything in room temperature. That will make the cake come out soft.

Ingredients:

All purpose flour or maida - 3 cups
sugar - 3 cups
butter - 2 sticks ( 1 cup)
eggs - 5
salt - a pinch
milk - 1 cup
baking soda - 1/2 tsp ( dissolve it in 1 tbsp hot water and keep)
vanilla essence - 2 tsp

Method:

In a bowl, take sugar and butter and cream them together very well with a whisk or electric mixer.

Add eggs one by one and mix them in.
Add salt and then add milk slowly and keep mixing.
Add flour slowly spoon by spoon and incorporate it well.
Add vanilla essence and baking soda in water and give it a final mix.
In between all these mixing remember to scrap down the edges at times.

Pour it into a buttered pan and gently tap it to release any air bubbles.

Bake in 300F for about 1 hour. [ depending on the oven the time might vary from 50 min to 1 hr and 10 min, so better start checking it at 50 min ]
Check for doneness.
Cool in pan for 10 minutes.

Turn it out and cool completely.

Enjoy!

note : This cake is a little denser type but moist. If you try the "Tea Cake" recipe in the blog, it will give you a more spongier cake but will be to the drier side. When going for icing and filling go for the more matching version of the cake with it.

Arachuvitta Fish Curry

Fish - 1 lb (1/2 kg) (i used red snapper here)

onion - 2 big

ginger& garlic - 1 tbsp

turmeric powder - 1/4 tsp

kashmiri chilli powder - 2 tsp

coriander powder - 1/2 tsp

kudam puli(kerala fish puli) - 2 pieces

coconut milk - 1/2 cup

oil

mustard

curry leaves

Clean and cut the fish into pieces. Soak kudam puli in some water.

Heat 2 tsp of oil. Splutter mustard and curry leaves.

Add ginger and garlic, followed by onion and saute well.

Add turmeric, chilli and coriander powder and saute for a minute.

Switch it off and grind it well.

Add it back to the pot along with kudam puli and the water which it was soaked.

Allow it to boil well. Add salt too.

Now add the fish pieces and allow it to cook for 8-10 minutes depending on the fish you are using.

Add the coconut milk and let it simmer for a minute.

Done.

Koobum Payarum(Banana flower-Green gram dal) Thoran

This is a nice dry dish with lot of nutrients. Banana Flower is fiber rich and has lot of vitamins. More than that it has got many medicinal properties . Then green gram dal, its one of the very good in its family with lot of proteins and crab. This dal wont make you heavy or wont create gas problem. So in total its a great dish.

Vazha koombu /Banana flower - 1

Green gram dal - 1/2 cup

turmeric powder - 1/2 tsp

coconut grated - 1/4 to 1/2 cup

green chillies - 1

salt to taste

oil

mustard

curry leaves

Clean and chop finely the vazha koombu and immerse it in water mixed with turmeric powder for 15 minutes.

If you are not familiar with it; remove the purple covers over it until you are no longer able to take it off and it will be yellow in colour. Save the flowers you find on the way.

To clean the flowers you need some patience. If you plan to use that separate the tough parts, the stigma and transparent cover, otherwise discard that.

Finely chop all and soak in turmeric water.

Pressure cook green gram dal with enough water and salt.

Squeeze out the water from the chopped vazha koombu.

In a pan add 2 tsp of oil, splutter mustard and curry leaves and add chopped koombu.

Saute for about 5 minutes.

Crush coconut and green chilly.

Add the cooked green gram dal and crushed coconut.

Check for salt.

Saute for a couple of minutes until its dry.

Done.

Chembu Asthram / Taro root curry

This is a coconut yogurt based curry with taro root. The name is kind of fancy, but the recipe is similar to kaalan.

Taro root / Chembu - 5 or 6

coconut - 3/4th cup(grated)

small onion - 3

cumin seeds - 1/2 tsp

yogurt/curd - 1/2 cup

turmeric powder - a pinch

chilli powder - 1/2 to 1 tsp (depending on the heat)

salt to taste

Clean and cut taro root(chembu). While cleaning scrap off all the brown and green skin completely.

Take them in a vessel. Cover with water. Add turmeric,chilli powders and salt and let it cook well.

Grind together coconut,small onions and cumin seeds to a smooth paste.

Add yogurt into the ground mixture and add them to the cooked roots.

Keep the flame in lowest. Let it gently heat through.dont let it boil.

Season oil with mustard seeds,dry red chilli,chopped small onions and curry leaves and pour over the chembu curry. Done.